Embodiments of the invention relate generally to a micro-electromechanical system (MEMS) switch, and more specifically, a MEMS microswitch having a dual actuator and shared gate.
Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) are electromechanical devices that generally range in size from a micrometer to a millimeter in a miniature sealed package. A MEMS device in the form of a microswitch has a movable actuator, sometimes referred to as a movable electrode, that is moved toward a stationary electrical contact by the influence of a gate driver (also referred to as a gate or substrate electrode) positioned on a substrate below the movable actuator. The movable actuator may be a flexible beam that bends under applied forces such as electrostatic attraction, magnetic attraction and repulsion, or thermally induced differential expansion, that closes a gap between a free end of the beam and the stationary contact. If a large enough differential voltage exists between the free end of the beam and the stationary electrical contact, a resulting electrostatic force can cause the beam to self-actuate without any gating signal being provided by a gate driver. In certain current switching applications, this self-actuation can result in catastrophic failure of the switch or downstream systems.
Thus, it is desirable to design a MEMS switch that can hold-off an increased amount of voltage while avoiding self-actuation.